- Alexander Varshavsky
Alexander Varshavsky is a Russian American biochemist and recipient of the
Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research , theWolf Prize in Medicine and theLouisa Gross Horwitz Prize fromColumbia University in 2001 for his research onubiquitin ation. He is currently researching atCaltech .He has won the 2007 $1 million Gotham Prize for an original approach to killing cancer cells. Alexander Varshavsky proffered the idea of a targeted molecular device that could enter a cell, examine it for DNA deletions specific to cancer and killing it if it meets the right profile. "(It) involves, in a nutshell, the finding of a genuine Achilles Heel of cancer cells, i.e., their potentially vulnerable feature that won't change during tumor progression," said Varshavsky.
The approach termed deletion-specific targeting (DST), employs HDs (homozygous DNA deletions) as the targets of cancer therapy. "In contrast to other attributes of cancer cells, their HDs are immutable markers." "If the DST strategy can be implemented in a clinical setting, it may prove to be both curative and free of side effects."
References
* [http://biology.caltech.edu/Members/Varshavsky Caltech bio]
* [http://www.gothamprize.org/ The Gotham prize]External links
* [http://www.cumc.columbia.edu/horwitz/ The Official Site of Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize]
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